


Like a Leaf to a Branch

by gaslightgallows (hearts_blood)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Awkward Conversations, Children, Difficult Decisions, F/M, Gen, Introspection, Parenthood, Past Relationship(s), Post-Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Prompt Fill, Reunions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-28
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-04-29 01:25:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14462136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hearts_blood/pseuds/gaslightgallows
Summary: Loki makes a friend during the trip from Asgard to Earth who turns out to be connected to an even older friend…





	1. Figuring Things Out

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt “Why didn’t you tell me?” (Loki/Sif) requested by Anonymous. There was really no other way my brain would interpret this one… (New movie what new movie?)
> 
> **Edit: By popular demand, this is no longer a one-shot. Further chapters will be forthcoming, so you might want to subscribe for updates. :)**
> 
> If you're over on Tumblr, please consider following me at [gaslightgallows.tumblr.com](http://gaslightgallows.tumblr.com) for more fic, reblogs about writing, and lots of randomness. Thank you for reading and especially for commenting. Comments are love. ♥

There were a number of refugees who had come onto the _Statesman_ with infants and small children – not enough to sustain their population in the long-term, by Loki’s calculation, but though Asgardians historically trended towards low birthrates, they had ways of improving fertility, and they were nothing if not a lusty people. There would be a baby boom once they were settled, he was sure of it.

One that he, as a confirmed non-Asgardian, would likely not be contributing to.

Probably for the best, he reflected, even as he played hide-and-seek with a pack of six-and-seven-year-olds, in one of the larger chambers that had been turned into a nursery and creche. The minders had initially been wary of his presence there, but the eldest among them remembered how he had been in his younger days, when Frigga had taken him to visit the schools in the city, and smiled on him and let him be.

For all of that, Loki knew that with his heritage and his sins, he would undoubtedly make a poor father.

But the refugee children soothed that occasional ache. They were as wild as wolf cubs and entirely unawed by him, which Loki deeply appreciated, and they were all seemingly without fear, either – one of them, Ullr, a little dark-haired snippet of a boy no higher than Loki’s knees, was so determined to find which of the laughing princes was the real one that he kept on launching himself at the simulacra, and was utterly undaunted when he felt through the image of Loki and hit the deck plating. Even after the other children tired of the game, Ullr was as bullheaded as a day was long and he just ran to the next Loki and tried again.

“I got you!” he shrieked in delight when he finally, _finally_ found the real Loki, and proceeded to climb his prize like a tree. Loki laughed and then yelped where the small boots dug into his ribs, but he stood still until Ullr had triumphed and was sitting on his hip and eye-level with him, looking at him with laughing eyes as green as grass in summer.

Loki’s breath stuttered in his throat. It was the first time Ullr had stayed still enough for him to get a good look at the boy and… _Don’t be an idiot. No… no, surely not. But… if it **were** true, who…?_

A soft chime over the ship’s speakers announced the arrival of the ship in the orbit of Vanaheim, where Thor had directed the _Statesman_ to go to retrieve any Asgardians who wished to travel to Earth. Some of the child-minders left the nursery to go and greet the newcomers, and one of them, a woman called Nanna, tried to take Ullr from Loki’s arms. Loki had to bite back a protective hiss behind his teeth.

“No!” the boy said firmly, tightening his arms around Loki’s neck, clinging to him like a leaf to a branch. “I’ll stay here.”

Silently, Loki thanked Ullr for saying with a child’s bluntness what had been at the tip of his own tongue. “It’s fine,” he assured the young woman, who was looking from the prince to her charge nervously. “I’ll see that Master Ullr gets into no trouble until you return.”

“With respect, my lord, coming from you, that is difficult to believe,” Nanna ventured, though she smiled as she said it.

Loki grinned. “I acknowledge that fact, but nevertheless, I stand fast. Go and greet whomever it is you are expecting. We’ll be here when you return.”

Nanna could not disobey a direct order from the prince, so she went, glancing back at them with a soft sort of apprehension.

“I wonder if she thinks I’m not fit company for you, pup,” Loki mused.

“Well, _I_ like you.”

“Thank you,” Loki said, absurdly pleased at the compliment.

“My mama’s on Vanaheim,” said Ullr, matter-of-factly. “Nanna says she’s coming on the ship. That’s who she’s gone to get.”

“I’m glad to hear it. That means you’ll get to see her soon.”

“Is your mama on Vanaheim?”

Loki’s smile faded. “No, I’m afraid she’s not.”

Ullr tilted his head to one side. “Where is she?”

“Valhalla, I suspect.”

“Oh.” Ullr blinked and then flopped forward and buried his face in Loki’s shoulder, clearly embarrassed. “My papa’s not in Valhalla,” he said, by way of apology. “He was a bad man.”

Loki felt a sudden twist of pain in his chest, but before he could speak, the door of the creche opened and both he and the boy turned to see who it was.

“Mama!” Ullr shouted in delight. He wriggled down from Loki’s arms and pelted towards the newcomer, a sturdy, elegant dark-haired woman who scooped him up and hugged him tightly.

“Oh, my own,” she crooned, cradling the back of his head, “I have _missed_ you.”

This time, Loki felt his heart stop.

“You’ve been gone _forever_ ,” Ullr said. “We had to run away from home because a bad lady came, but I’ve been a good boy for Nanna, and I made a new friend.” He turned and pointed at the prince.

The woman looked up from her child with narrowed eyes.

“Loki,” she said, warily.

He could barely find his voice. He wanted to be angry, or frightened, or… something. But all he could think was, _I never thought I would see you again._

“Hello, Sif.”

* * *

Later, after Sif and her child had been installed in private quarters, and the boy had exhausted himself into unconsciousness running about and getting in everyone’s way on the bridge, she allowed Loki to accompany her back to her suite so that they could talk.

She carried Ullr herself, and Loki did not try to object. But when the boy was undressed and laid in his bed, Loki looked down at the sleeping child who shared his eyes, and could not contain himself any longer. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked quietly.

Sif pulled a blanket over her son and smoothed his thick hair from his forehead. “When was I to tell you? He was born when we thought you lost to the Void.”

“And then I was unlost, and rotted in Asgard’s dungeons for a year,” Loki reminded her, his jaw tight with emotion and the strain of speaking in low tones so as not to wake Ullr. “Could you not have found a few minutes to sneak down and mention to me that our occasional ill-advised liaisons had resulted in a child? A new branch for the royal family tree?”

“I told _no one_ ,” Sif retorted, and grabbed his arm to drag him into the next room. “Not that I was with child and not that you were the father. Not Thor, not the king – not even your mother. The only person who knows he exists is Nanna, who has cared for him since birth.”

“But you told the boy.” Loki swallowed. “You were honest with him.”

“Yes, he knows that I am his mother.”

“You also told him that his father was dead. That he died dishonorably, that he was a bad man–”

“Would you have had me lie to him?” Sif demanded, her eyes flashing angrily. “He knows that his father was a good man once, who lost his way because he thought he was one thing and discovered he was another. I was not about to ruin my son the way you were ruined!”

He stepped back as though struck. And for a long time, they simply stared at each other, angry and hurt and terrified of what was to come.

“If that’s the way you feel, you should take him back to Vanaheim and stay there,” said Loki finally. “If you come with us, you won’t be able to keep him safe. No one will.”

“My duty is to my king.”

“My mother believed the same thing. Look how that worked out for everyone. Should your loyalty not continue to be to your son?”

It was Sif’s turn to be stunned into silence. She opened her mouth to speak and–

“Mama?”

Ullr’s tousled dark head appeared around the corner.

Sif bit back her anger at Loki and gave her son a fond but stern look. “Go back to bed, my own.”

“No.” He padded over to them and attached himself to Loki’s leg. “Don’t yell at Loki. I like him.”

The small declaration did strange things to Loki’s stomach. He reached down and plucked Ullr from his leg, depositing him in Sif’s arms. “Young man, you listen to your mother.”

Ullr stuck his tongue out at Loki and laughed.

Sif looked at him over her son’s head. _We will figure this out later,_ said her expression.

Fear and joy roiling his stomach, Loki found that he was rather looking forward to that.


	2. Keeping Secrets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While their child sleeps, Loki and Sif talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See, I told you there would be more. ;)
> 
> If you're over on Tumblr, please consider following me at [gaslightgallows.tumblr.com](http://gaslightgallows.tumblr.com) for more fic, reblogs about writing, and lots of randomness. Thank you for reading and especially for commenting. Comments are love. ♥

The first person they would tell, they decided, was their son. 

It had to be Ullr first, before anyone else. He was the one who mattered most, and he deserved to know, even more than Thor. “Besides,” Sif pointed out, as she and Loki sat in the common area of her suite, nursing drinks after putting the entirely reluctant boy back to bed, “he is disturbingly good at keeping secrets.”

“Is he?” Loki grinned over his glass and tried his best not to look too puffed up. 

“Yes. It’s something we have had words about many times.”

His pleased expression faded. “Ah. Of course, you would seek to suppress any traits he might have inherited from me.”

Sif let out a short huff. “Loki, he’s seven.”

“Children should be allowed their secrets.”

“I agree, but if he has all of your cunning, then he has his stubbornness from the both of us, and I do not want him to feel that he _must_ keep secrets from me. He should feel able to trust his mother.”

“...I can’t exactly argue with that.” Loki swallowed what remained in his glass and reached for the bottle. Then he paused and looked up at her. “He will never have any reason to fear me, Sif. I know you believe me to be incapable of speaking anything but lies, but—” 

“I’ve never known you to harm a child,” she said quietly. “And... it has never been your way to strike first, at least in my recollection. You keep your own counsel, until you are slandered or attacked. Or hurt.”

Loki’s jaw tightened, and he reached again for the bottle. “So he’s seven years old. Exactly when was he born?”

“Six months after you fell from the Bifrost.”

Loki thought back. There had not been over-many liaisons between the two of them, though there had certainly been enough to make separating them out somewhat difficult, but as he cast his mind back to Before (an effort in itself; he worked very hard _not_ to think about Before), he remembered one very dark, very long, very warm night. 

“Yes,” he murmured. “Yes, of course.” And he closed his eyes against remembering more. 

Sif finished her drink but kept hold of the glass, toying with it. “After I realized… I didn’t feel able to tell anyone. Not even the queen. She had relayed to us the truth of your birth and the reasons behind your actions, and… perhaps I was wrong to conceal my pregnancy from her, but…”

“No,” said Loki softly, disloyalty and anguish warring in his heart. “You did the right thing, Sif. Better… better to have kept him away from court. Away from all of it.” A little smile tugged at his lips. “He is delightfully unspoilt.”

“I wish I could take credit for that. Nanna has been with him since he was born, and in my service for some months before that. I needed a caregiver during my pregnancy, and someone to care for Ullr when I returned to court.” Sif’s eyes were sad. “And not long after my return, I was sent with Thor and the Warriors Three to quell unrest in the Nine Realms.”

Unrest that Loki had caused. She didn’t say it. There was no need. They both knew it. 

“And then shortly after the Dark Elves were driven back, Odin posted me to Vanaheim. I’ve not spent more than a few weeks in my son’s company since he was two. Nanna’s more his mother than I am.”

Something else that Loki had caused, though he could not have known it, at the time. Small comfort, then, that even if Odin had been the one to give the order, he had not known about Sif’s son, either. “Does Nanna know? About me?”

“Which? That you are Ullr’s father or that you’re actually a Frost Giant? Because everyone knows that now,” Sif said, with a dry little smile. “You always did have a theatrical flair. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you turned your hand to play-writing.”

“Ah. Well....” Loki twitched his shoulders in a rather sheepish shrug. “Dross for the masses. Though I’m sure there was some gold in there somewhere.”

“The same might be said about you.”

Loki shot her a look of utter astonishment, though he quickly masked it. “Do you know, I think that’s the first kind thing you’ve ever said about me. And you said it knowing that I’m a monster. Impressive. Still, you’ve had some years to get used to the idea… and a small blue child running around the house. …It must have given you a shock, when he was born.”

But Sif shook her head. “When he was born, he is exactly as you seem him now. Entirely Asgardian. Never once did he display even a hint of blue skin or red eye. Sometimes I contemplated trying to trigger the change, but...” She hesitated. 

“You were afraid,” Loki finished, with a hint of a sneer. 

“I was, yes. I am not proud of that. And,” she continued, “there was also the boy to consider. If he could not will a change naturally, then perhaps there was nothing to uncover, so why upset him? That is why, even knowing the secret of your heritage by that point, I didn’t entirely believe it. The illusion that shields your Jotun visage seems to have passed down to Ullr.”

“It is not precisely an illusion,” said Loki slowly. “Once I was made aware of the... realities of my existence, as much as I had no wish to, I was compelled to study it.”

Sif raised an eyebrow. “‘Compelled’? By who?”

He grimaced. “By my own demanding curiosity. And because once I was aware of it, it became one of those niggling little physical quirks where, unless I was thinking about it, I would start to shift between states of being. Which is always awkward.”

And that, he reflected, was being understated. What might have happened if, when Thor had called his bluff on that last day, Odin had suddenly transformed into a black-haired, red-eyed Frost Giant of unimpressive size? 

It would have made for impressive theatre, if nothing else. And as Sif said, he was nothing if not theatrical. A pity.

“If not illusion, then what? Instinctive shape-shifting?”

“Of a sort. It’s a physiological shifting of the cells. This outward appearance...” Loki gestured to himself. “Reflects an inward biology. At the moment, for all intents and purposes, I _am_ one hundred percent Asgardian. If I were to will the change to the... other form, I would be biologically Jotnar. And I would assume,” he continued blandly, “that that inner biology would extend to matters of reproduction.”

Sif nodded slowly. “Ullr was conceived before any of us knew the truth of your heritage,” she said, after a moment. 

“Yes. It’s entirely possible, from my understanding of my unique circumstances, at least, that genetically, he is utterly of Asgard and may never show signs of being anything else.” A slight quaver entered Loki’s voice. “And I would be profoundly grateful to the Norns for that kindness.”


End file.
